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Lord of the flies characterization and symbolism
Lord of the flies characterization and symbolism
Comparing and contrasting characters in the lord of the flies
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Lord of the Flies is a book written by William Golding that has many symbolic features hidden within itself. It starts with a plane crashing into an island somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. The book goes through many twists and turns, where the characters drift apart. Lord of the Flies ends with the characters of the book getting rescued while the rest of the island is burning down. Lord of the Flies includes symbols by showing them throughout the novel, whether they´re important or not.
After a while these flies found Simon. Gorged, they alighted by his runnels of sweat and drank. They ticked under his nostrils and played leapfrog on his thighs. They were black and iridescent green and without number; and in front of Simon, the Lord of the Flies hung on his stick and grinned." (138) Lord of the Flies Lord of the Flies represents evil.
Often in our society we tend to form hierarchies and rules which dictate the way we run things, and in Lord of the Flies it’s no different. Although, the author uses the characters and other symbols in the book to portray society in many differing ways. For example, the Conch is probably the most obvious symbol, it could be seen as representing power or order. William Golding uses symbolization like this to shake our perception on how we see things. Another example, could be Ralph.
People can change drastically when things are turned around in an instant. The Lord of the Flies is a book about young boys, whose plane has just crashed and they are stranded on the island without any adults. The young boys change throughout the novel; here, on the island, innocence is gone and their savage side comes out. William Golding uses symbols such as the conch, the signal fire and the beast in the Lord of the Flies to signify chaos, calmness, hope and fear which is intended to be represented by all of these things.
The Lord of the Flies is a pig’s head on a stick that they stuck in the “earth.” Later on in the chapter Simon is hallucinating that he is talking to it. “‘There isn’t anyone to help you. Only me. And I’m the Beast.’
In my project, I depicted the symbolism of Jack and the pig in William Golding’s Lord Of The Flies. In the beginning, Jack names himself a hunter; this illustrates the savage side of human nature. As the novel continues, and the desire to hunt and kill increases, and Jack finds himself not only a hunter but also feeling like he is being hunted. This change represents how fear overpowers hope and fuels the dominance of savagery. In the end of the novel, Jack turns from hunting pigs to hunting Ralph.
The Heraia Games were games much like those of the Olympics, except they were in the honor of Hera. The Heraia Games were started in 6 AD by Queen Hippodameia. They were the first events to ever be held in the Olympic stadium. Like the Olympics, they rotated every four years, but because they were the first event to ever occur in the Olympic Stadium, they were always one year earlier than the Olympics.
In William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, the Lord of the Flies signifies the power of evil and violence within people. When Simon imagines the pig’s head speaking to him, the pig’s head implies, “I’m the reason why it’s no go? Why things are what they are? ” (143). The Lord of the Flies symbolizes chaos and corruption that’s caused by the boys on the island.
Many children dream of a place where they can run wild and not have any adult supervision, but few consider the consequences like their inner evil coming out and their humanity changing. In the novel, Lord of the Flies, by William Golding, symbolism is a key part in communicating the theme of The Inhumanity/Inherent Evil of Man through the conch, the fire, and the Lord of the Flies. The fires symbolism of evil can be shown by the boys going wild at the sight of it and starting their wild chant, often hurting people. The lord of the flies holds symbolic power because it represents the boy's inner evil, and that they are the real “beasts.” The conch is seen through the boy's destruction of the island and each other throughout the book.
Lord of the Flies remains Golding’s most accredited piece of work. It is an apparently simple but densely layered novel that has been categorized as fiction, fable, a myth, and a tale. Generous use of symbolism in Golding’s work is what distinguishes him with other authors of the same genre. For example, the conch shell, that represents a vulnerable hold of authority which was finally shattered to pieces with Piggy’s death. Secondly, for the other boys, Piggy’s eyeglasses represented the lack of intelligence which was later defeated by superstition and savagery.
The Lord of the Flies novel, by William Golding, is a symbolic allegory, delving deep into the true horrors of war, savagery, and the loss of innocence throughout the duration of time the children spent on the island. I the novel a situation arises involving a dead parachutist, still he represents so much more than Mr. Golding makes apparent. Commonly applied to the story is the ideology of a “beast,” the concept behind these two aspects are similar, yet have a distinct separation between them. Just like the notion of the “beast” and the dead parachutist is the “Lord of the Flies” himself, pertaining to reasons related to that of the other two major examples of symbolism. The dead parachutist is so much more than what you see, you must go deeper
Literary Analyses of the Lord of the Flies The Lord of the Flies demonstrates a wide variety of symbolism; from Christ to Satan the children are portrayed in an abstract manner to represent these religious beings, as well as a symbol of great strife for power. Two of the main symbolic devices are used in the form of a mystical Conch and a cumbersome Sow’s head perched atop a stake; however these symbols represent very different ideas. Next the Lord of the Flies demonstrates the burden and struggle of power in multiple ways. William Golding included within this novel the power of symbolism, using inanimate objects, characters, or even landmasses to represent ideals derived from basic human morals and Christian religion that has a major influence
Lord of the Flies by William Golding, is about a group of schoolboys who are stranded on the island, the boys come in contact with many objects that become symbolic throughout the novel. Through the use of the symbols Golding demonstrates that humans allow natural capacity for their evil to dominate their innocence. One of the major symbolic objects in the novel is the conch shell, the conch symbolizes civilization and order and it is used when one wants to talk or when Ralph calls for a meeting. We soon realize throughout the book that the conch loses its meaning of order. Another major symbol is the “Lord of the Flies”, it symbolizes “Beelzebub” meaning the force of evil.
Golding says “The boys broke into shrill, exciting cheering” (41) in the beginning of the novel, then at the end of the novel says, “A great clamor rose among the savages” (164). William Golding who wrote The Lord of the Flies changes his word choice from “boys” to “savages” to emphasize the fact that the boys change into savage creatures. Three symbols represent civilization and change into chaos over the course of the novel. The three symbols representing change are Piggy’s glasses, The fire, and the conch. These figures demonstrate the important theme that the calm civilization will soon break out into disorder.
Symbols are objects, characters, colours or figures that are often used in literature to add a greater meaning to a text. One must comprehend the significance of symbols to fully understand a literary work. In Lord of the Flies by William Golding, the Conch and the Fire are both important symbols that are presented in the allegory. Nonetheless, it is evident that the Fire is more significant than the Conch when one considers the plot, character and theme. To begin with, the Fire plays a more important role than the Conch because it continues to effectively develop the plot.
